Naming Our Need--November 10, 2021
"Pray for us; we are sure that we have a clear conscience, desiring to act honorably in all things. I urge you all the more to do this, so that I may be restored to you very soon." [Hebrews 13:18-19]
Just when I think this older brother in the faith has run out of things to teach me, BAM, he pulls a life-changing piece of wisdom out of his robe and takes me to school all over again.
And honestly, I think it's this lesson, here in the back half of the last chapter of the book we have from him, that directly impacts me more than any we have looked at so far. I mean, sure, it's been interesting to hear the writer of Hebrews draw insights and conclusions from the seemingly tiniest and most obscure details from the saga of ancient Israel. But so often, those insights just stay as "head knowledge" that doesn't move to my heart or my hands. Today, he has said something that can't help but change me... if I dare to let it.
For one, this is the first time in this entire work that the writer (so far anonymous) has pulled back the curtain, so to speak, to acknowledge himself. And it's a little bit jarring honestly, for him all of a sudden to use the first-person-singular, "I," and to ask for people to pray for him and those with him, after twelve and a half chapters of "they" or "he" or "God" or "Christ" doing things. It's rather like when a TV or movie character breaks the "fourth wall," as they call it, and looks right at the camera to talk to the people watching, whether it's Matthew Broderick's Ferris Bueller or Woody Allen's Alvy Singer from Annie Hall, or whatever other shows and movies do the same trick. So now all of a sudden, the narrator of this letter finally speaks to us and acknowledges that he's a person who has been writing all of this to us.
And what's more--he writes now to ask us a favor. He writes, no longer as wise teacher explaining the Scriptures and mysteries of God to us, for our benefit, but rather as someone in need of prayer himself. He writes to ask us--we who have been reading, pondering, and sometimes scratching our heads at his teaching--to pray for him. That is a humbling thing to do, if you are the one used to praying for others, teaching other people or doling out the things you think you know about God. It is a reminder that he needs help as well--and his honesty to recognize his own need for others to pray for him is an example for us, too. It sure is for me.
It's not that the writer of Hebrews is now in some terrible trouble or moral dilemma. He doesn't write asking for help because he has committed some terrible sin or faces some specific problem and doesn't know what to do. He says, rather, he's convinced that he has a clear conscience--that he can "look everybody in the eye," as it were. And yet, it is just at those points when we are pretty sure we are on the right track in life that we especially need others, both to keep their eyes open where we may yet have blind-spots, and to pray for us.
What amazes me about this short couple of sentences is the posture of humility that our author takes. He has arrived at a position of some maturity in faith and life, and yet that doesn't lead him to think he's got all the answers and none of the weak places. He doesn't say, "Since I've got a clear conscience, I don't need you all to spend a moment's thought for me or my needs, because I'm covered. You all just worry about yourselves." Rather, he invites--he comes out and just plain asks--for his readers to keep praying for him, including that he and his readers would be reunited. That maturity, the kind that keeps recognizing humbly the need for others to pray and support and direct us, is such a rare bird, especially if we are in a time of life where we think we know what we are doing and "have a clear conscience." Those times can be especially dangerous for us to get set on a dangerous or bad path, exactly because we've told ourselves we have all the answers and don't need help anymore.
One of the odd blessings, on the other hand, of going through seasons of deep trouble and turmoil is that they have a way of removing our pretensions that we have all the answers. When you are struggling through a life crisis, grieving a deep loss, regretting a bad decision that has blown up in your face, or wrestling with a major temptation in your life, there's at least some likelihood you'll recognize your need. It's the publicly hated tax collector who can only muster the prayer, "Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner," whom Jesus says goes home justified from worship, after all, while the Respectable Religious person who prattles on about his own virtue and greatness is really just praying to himself.
All too often, I think we succumb to the temptation of Respectable Religiosity, the temptation that says, "You already believe in God, and you have not made the mistakes of THAT person, or THOSE people over there--you really probably don't need any other help from here. Just trust your own gut to guide you." And because we have told ourselves we don't need any direction, any prayer support, any accountability, we end up assuming whatever our Respectably Religious gut says, we must be in line with the way of Jesus. And once we've made that move... disaster awaits. I don't know how many times I've been absolutely devastated to see folks I have known and cared for, people who grew up in church and consider themselves devout and pious, spouting terribly un-Christ-like things, whether in conversation with other like-minded folks, on social media where they seem to be spoiling for a fight, or on the flagpoles and car bumpers they have access to. There comes to be this disconnect where folks sometimes think they don't need anybody else--or even God--to correct them where their actions and attitudes have turned in the opposite direction of the God we know in Jesus. And when that happens, it is often more difficult to get through to hearts that are hardened than to reach someone who knows they have messed up and can only muster, "Lord have mercy on me..." as their prayer.
And of course, the moment I start climbing up on my own high horse to be disappointed with others whose hypocrisy breaks my heart, I run the risk of missing my own rough edges that require Jesus' correction and sanding down. The moment I want to go off on my own jeremiad over the person with the cross around their neck and the Confederate flag in their yard, or who seems to think "Me and My Group First" lines up with the way of Jesus, or the petulant name-calling on social media from folks who also proudly boast of "loving God" in the same breath, the writer of Hebrews brings me up short. I have to keep asking others to pray for me, that God will direct me in good directions and help me to love my neighbors. The moment I decide only to look at what other people are doing that disappoints me, I run the risk I will not be able to see the ways my choices, my words, and my actions break God's heart, too. That doesn't mean whatever mean or rotten things other folks are doing (thinking they have clear consciences while they do them) are OK--but it means that my first responsibility is to look honestly at myself and ask for God's direction where I am out of step or off course. The moment I think I'm righteous enough not to need any help is likely the moment I'm most in danger of losing sight of Jesus. A critical change happens when I move from, "I am a religious person, and therefore have all the answers," to "I am trying my best to live and love like Jesus, but I could be wrong, and so I need the help of God and others." That's the change the writer of Hebrews offers to us today with his own example.
So help me, dear ones. Help me out. I'm going to borrow a page from the writer of Hebrews unabashedly, and I'll invite you to do the same in your own lives. Ask the people around you to keep you in prayer, especially at the times you think you've got all the answers. I ask you, too, to help me as well: pray, certainly, and where you see I am missing my own blind-spots and rough edges that keep me from being like Christ, help me to see them... so that I can grow.
And when we all do that together, I suspect we'll find ourselves recipients of more grace than we realized we needed--the grace of being beloved even when we are wrong... and the grace to grow and mature out of old and rotten ways into the new life we are given in Christ.
Lord God, help us all. Where each of us is walking in love, strengthen us. Where any of us are out of step with your Reign, bring us back into your cadence. Where I am unable to see my own need, smack me upside the head with reminders and wake-up calls to see clearly and truly once again.
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